Hundreds of people lined up in Hong Kong to see a Vincent van Gogh painting put on public display for the first time in more than 60 years. The work is expected to set a record price for the artist at auction next month.
Van Gogh's 1890 painting "Châtaigniers en fleurs," or "Blossoming Chestnut Trees," went on view at Sotheby's gallery in Hong Kong on the 13th ahead of an auction in New York on Nov. 18, according to Reuters and AFP.
Sotheby's said the painting has not been shown publicly for more than 60 years. The auction house expects it to sell for $180 million (about 242 billion won), far above the previous high. The current record for a van Gogh is the $117.2 million (about 158 billion won) paid in 2022 for "Orchard with Cypresses."
Van Gogh, a Dutch-born painter, completed the work in May 1890 while staying in Auvers-sur-Oise after leaving a psychiatric hospital in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, France.
Considered one of the major works from his Auvers period, the painting shows chestnut trees in full bloom filling the canvas, with a man passing three women in traditional Japanese dress. It is marked by impasto, an oil technique in which paint is applied in thick layers.
Van Gogh died on July 29 that year, about two months after finishing the painting, at the age of 37. Works from the Auvers period, the final stretch of his life, rarely come to market.
The sale is expected to draw collectors, museums and investors. "This is one of the most expressive and hopeful of the last works van Gogh left as he was bringing his life as a painter to a close," Scott Nichol, a vice chairman at Sotheby's, told AFP. The traces of frenzied layering of paint show that van Gogh still had so much he wanted to express and was hurrying to get it onto the canvas, Nichol added.
The painting is one of 12 works from the collection of the late Argentine art collectors Nelly Arrieta de Blaquier and Carlos Pedro Blaquier. Works by Claude Monet, Camille Pissarro and Paul Cézanne will also be offered at the sale.
Cézanne's "Arlequin," also going under the hammer, has likewise not been seen in public for decades. It is expected to fetch about $120 million (about 161 billion won).